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This was the last day of the Columbia River Gorge Biennial Classic. We chose to do a flat walk on the Washington side of the river.

Directions said to proceed 3 miles from the end of the Bridge of the Gods west on SR14. We were to look for a Brown Sign on the right side of the road that said Fort Cascade. We never saw such a sign, so we turned around at Beacon Rock and retraced our route. Back at Bridge of the Gods we turned around and tried it again. We saw a sign (not brown and not 3 miles) that said Fort Cascade so we turned left and followed the road and sure enough saw a yellow sign for the walk.

We walked along the river to the Fort Cascade Kiosk.

Trail leaving the Kiosk headed off into the woods.

Leaving the woods we continued along the river eventually passing a water treatment plant.

Everything was fine until we came to the Stop sign. The directions said to walk between the barrier and take path on the left onto Strawberry Island. There were cars coming so we thought there is the barrier the trail is to the left and we turned walking along the river looking for an Island.

When I stopped to take this picture another walker passed us and continued along the river ahead of us.

We walked along the river for a very long time looking for the island.

Until we somehow ended up here which was way down on the directions.

I skipped to this point in the directions and it said turn around and retrace your steps. Knowing that we had missed a lot of this event, we headed back toward our car.

We eventually saw some walkers high up on a hill to our left so we cut across and pickup up that path. Here is Beacon Rock in the background.

Which brought us to the barrier we should have walked through but didn’t see because of the traffic and the preconceived idea that Strawberry Island was really an “Island”.

From there back to the finish we were on the official trail.

We passed a lot of these plants with huge leaves.

Remains of the Cascade Portage Railroad

Thomas McNatt (1828-1861)

Once again we had a great walk, just not the one that they had planned for us!

After hiking up and down Eagle Creek we drove West on I-5 to the Junction with HWY 35 and went to see Mount Hood. We had clear weather so we had high hopes and we weren’t disappointed. This is the first turnout for picture taking of Mt Hood on Hwy 35.

We came to two more turnouts and joined others who stopped to take pictures.

We finally made it to the parking lot of Timberline Lodge at the base of Mt. Hood. Love the snow.

I took a short hike in the snow but I wasn’t really dressed for it.

Ed refused to join me. This is as close to it as he got.

I asked another person what this mountain was in the distance and was told it was one of the Three Sisters?

Here is Timberline Lodge pictures. We really liked all the carved newel posts.

Driving back to I-5. Is that Mt. St. Helen’s blending into the clouds?

Mt. Hood from Panorama Point.

This would be the three sisters (I think).

The clouds blend in with the snow covered mountain. I’m thinking it might be St. Helen’s

This event was an out and back along Eagle Creek to the High Bridge. For those more ambitious the trail continued another 12K up to Crossover Falls, but we turned around at the high bridge and came back down. This turned out to be my favorite of the Columbia Gorge Events. Even though the trail was narrow in spots and wet in others, it was a great hike. For safety sake in a lot of places they had a steel cable you could hang onto. In a lot of other places you would have to be very short or have really long arms to be able to use the cable! It was a very busy trail. We were sharing it with a group of photographers carrying tripods. I was very glad when they all stopped at punch bowl falls and we could finish the hike to high bridge alone.

After hiking up and down Multnomah Falls we drove on East on Old HWY 30 to visit Vista House. It was built by the CCC and is probably the first “rest stop” ever built. We we driving along and suddenly there it was. I was impressed with the ladies bathroom done in marble. The information placard on Hwy 30 showed a tunnel that was destroyed when they built I-5 back in the 60s. The views of Vista House are from an overlook further east.

This is Part 2 – Coming down the mountain on the Wahkeena Falls Side. Lots more people on this side for some reason. We walked for a time with a Volksmarcher from Washougal, WA. Very nice talking to her.

This is Part 1 – Climbing up the mountain on the Multnomah Falls side. We parked at Wahkeena Falls parking area and hiked over to the Lodge at Multnomah Falls. From there it was a gently sloped trail to the Benson Bridge. Beyond the bridge, the asphalt trail is a series of steep switchbacks to a ridge crest where the trail split off to the overlook. The Overlook was closed due to a rock slide. Elevation gain to this point is 700 feet.

From there we continued on up the slope on natural trails with tree roots, rocks, etc. We passed Weisendanger Falls and then Echo Falls. When we came to the split in the trail for Larch Mountain, we turned right and continue to climb.

Somewhere along the way we started going over the top of Mulnomah Falls but we were so high up we couldn’t tell. Eventually we headed down on the Wahkeena Falls side of the mountain.

Our next event was the one at Multnomah Falls. We headed out on old HWY 30 to visit the falls and drove right by these falls. There was a pullout to stop and visit the falls so we did. I love waterfalls.